Remember during the 2008 campaign season, when progressives around the State of Washington were working their tails off to get Governor Gregoire re-elected because her opponent, Dino Rossi, just wasn’t sure if global warming existed.

Even Al Gore made a last minute plea for Gregoire at a fund raiser and Gregoire advisor, Jenny Durkan, warned all those present of just how much the environment would suffer under Rossi’s leadership.

Durkan said that in a Rossi administration, BIAW Executive Vice President Tom McCabe would be “the de facto Department of Ecology head.” She asked “How much would you pay not to have him running the Department of Ecology?”

Well, surprise, surprise!

Who knew that way back in 2007 Governor Gregoire had already decided it was imperative to keep the last remaining coal-fired power plant in Washington State operational. She even went as far as initiating secret negotiations with TransAlta, the plants owners, to avoid the prying eyes of the public.

Never mind the fact that burning coal to produce electricity is one of the biggest contributors to global warming, or that her friend, Al Gore, has called for a moratorium on the construction of new coal-fired plants and believes the U.S. should stop burning coal.

What should we do? We should stop burning coal . . . without sequestering the CO2. The coal and oil companies have spent in the United States alone a half a billion dollars in the first eight months of this year promoting a lie that there is such a thing as “clean coal.” Clean coal’s like healthy cigarettes — it does not exist. It could theoretically exist. The only demonstration plant was canceled. How many, how many such plants are there? Zero. How many blueprints? Zero.

Evidently, Gregoire was for global warming before she was against it. Sorry Al, it looks like we all got played.

The New York Times is reporting that China has laid big, bold plans to become a leading manufacturer of hybrid and all electric cars in just three years.

I sure hope its true.

If nothing else, the Walmart years has made it extremely easy to import goods from China, which–in this particular instance– is a good thing, since Detroit has stubbornly refused to build the clean cars the United States needs to break its dependence on foreign oil.

Do you think any of the suits still left at GM regret killing the EV1?

It allows utilities to reduce their annual new renewable-energy targets to their annual growth in their overall power needs. That change alone could cut 44% off I-937’s 2020 target, depriving the state of much-needed economic-development opportunities.

It cuts another eighth off I-937’s 2020 standard by grandfathering in old existing resources (particularly small hydro and biomass), and does nothing to create jobs and reduce climate emissions. Some of those resources have been operating since the 1800s.